


stars go up

by pomme (manta)



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: After University, Confessions, M/M, POV Second Person, Rated T for some swearing and suggestive themes, Stars
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-29
Updated: 2018-08-29
Packaged: 2019-07-04 05:35:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,056
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15834789
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/manta/pseuds/pomme
Summary: "So itcanbe an engagement ring if I want," Tooru insists, just because he can be petulant. But the fact that he can see himself going that far with you warms you in a way that the blankets don't."Idiot, aren't you missing a step? We'd have to be dating first.""Aren't we?" Tooru presses himself close. His thigh is warm against yours. "Haven't we been dating? For years?"





	stars go up

**Author's Note:**

  * For [skiecas](https://archiveofourown.org/users/skiecas/gifts).



> for sara, who is caring and thoughtful and pretty and loving and one of the sweetest, bestest friends anyone could ask for! (and very forgiving, as this was belated bc i'm a butt who's bad with dates alkfjlakfj)
> 
> she loves iwaoi and she's an amazing iwaoi writer, so i was just Fear.jpg the whole time but i had to attempt them for her! LOVE YOUUUUUUU

 

"This is a decent spot," you mutter to yourself.

The sun is just extinguishing itself behind the hill when you park on the curb, and Tooru stirs as you pull on the hand brake. You take advantage of those brief moments to appreciate his beautifully silent form, before he opens his mouth and removes all doubt.

The oncoming shadows have carved even more definition into his toned arms; the last rays linger on and highlight his long eyelashes as if reluctant to let them go. The pale scar under his right eye, obtained while retrieving a volleyball from a tree when he was seven, is thrown into sharp relief. He looks so good like this, the frowns in his face smoothed from sleep and his hair mussed up from friction against the headrest, instead of his expression and hairstyle arranged just so.

You won't tell him what you think of what you see—you'll never hear the end of it if you do.

Perhaps it's from knowing each other inside and out that you still know how to keep your own secrets. Or perhaps you only tell yourself that for reassurance; when you trace his cheek or when he runs a finger down your chest, it's impossible to conceal how much you want him.

"Open your eyes," you tell him, even though you know the order is thoroughly unnecessary. There was no point telling Tooru to cover his eyes in the first place; he'll have peeked because he's an incurable brown-nose who has to know everything. "Come on. Out."

Sure enough, Tooru doesn't ask where you've taken him, on account of already knowing where the two of you are. He opens the car door and promptly sneezes. "It's freezing!"

"What, you didn't bring a jacket?"

"I would've brought a warmer one, if you'd actually told me where we were going and hadn't just _abducted_ me after practice."

"Don't start whining. I washed the blankets, they're in the trunk."

Tooru turns his gaze away from the barely visible stars to survey you instead. "Ah. So you didn't just drive us out here without a second thought."

 

* * *

 

To be honest, you can't explain, even to yourself, how planned this trip was.

 

 

A trip too impulsively planned, and you'd disrupt the lives which the two of you have built.

You headed into sports medicine at your first choice university and, true to the promise you made to yourself, didn't look back. You enjoyed the thrill of competition and the satisfying feeling of a volleyball in your hands. But you functioned just fine playing weekend matches with friends and acquaintances, didn't _need_ volleyball in certain ways that involved intensive practices, international training camps, or courts so brightly lit to accommodate record crowds that they were blinding.

Tooru, on the other hand, gathered the hydrogen and helium that he had been accumulating for the majority of his life and took off, determined to make a name for himself in professional athletic history as a star. He was the one who accepted to universities on both academic and athletic scholarships, jetting off to faraway places, studying abroad, drinking in more experiences to build himself up.

It was the first time you and Tooru were truly separated, and you weren't sure what to expect.

But for all the times you called Tooru petty, fickle, or selfish, you couldn't describe him as inconsistent. Your phone was flooded with messages—many of them pensive, many of them infuriating. A good few of them were made in large batches, at 4 in the morning, or simply as multiple selfies. But Tooru made his presence known, refused to let himself be forgotten by you. You wouldn't have forgotten him anyway. But he wanted you to share more than simply what you remembered of him, being instead determined to make you learn what you saw of him.

The national volleyball team accepted him with open arms; you privately maintain that they would have been stupid not to. And Tooru held onto you doggedly enough that, when you were finally reunited on a too-early morning in the airport's arrival terminal, he had the impertinence to throw himself at you, luggage and all. Only you heard the sob: broken, as if held for years, before being wrenched from within and finding release.

"Still a dumbass," you said, speaking past the lump in your throat, even as you pulled him close and irrationally promised yourself that this time, you wouldn't let go.

Despite collapsing onto your sofa after another gruelling practice, he had been the one who'd settled the question of where you both would live after you had both graduated.

"Hey, I know that apartment had everything we wanted," you ventured. It was a dangerous topic to broach, given Tooru was almost too tired to talk and his eyebrows were knitted so close together they appeared connected. "But it's a two hour commute each way for you."

"And?" he had snapped, not even looking up from the text he was typing to Matsukawa.

Like a lengthy commute was a small price to pay. Like he would accept nothing less than to stay together, after he had learned what it was like to be apart.

 

 

A trip too strictly planned, and Tooru would know.

He's never needed specifics to sense the drumming of your fingers—on your shared kitchen counter, on the steering wheel, on his back—to perceive your restlessness. He has his arsenal of looks, and he reserves the one that cuts to the core for you when you're clearly irked, but won't share.

"What's eating you up, Iwa-chan? You're not a patient man."

It's true. You're not satisfied unless you're doing something about your problems.

But you can be patient, particularly when it comes to him. With him, you find you can be more than you expected, even of yourself.

You had realized that long ago, felt those stirrings the first time Tooru buried his face in the front of your hoodie. You had reprimanded him for crying, because you were both five and big five-year-old boys shouldn't be afraid of shadows in the night. But you wiped his tears and ordered him to blow into the tissue you held to his nose anyway, all the while startled by a powerful urge within you to protect him.

That desire to be more than you were carried you through high school, Tooru at your side when your team made and lost your bids for nationals, and then when you stood on the graduation stage, applauded by both of your families. And when you were still in university and about to live on your own, you texted him first, even if you weren't sure if he was in the same country as you at the time.

_I'm searching for a place to live that's near campus. Come look with me.  
_

Tooru's reply was almost immediate. _Don't be so presumptuous, Iwa-chan! We're not just down the street from each other anymore and I'm in high demand, you know. Taking time out of my busy schedule to go apartment hunting with you isn't that easy._

You put your phone down, reminded yourself not to expect too much. You thanked the girl who brought you your cup of steaming coffee, video chatted with Hanamaki to ask how he sprained his foot from tripping over his cat, searched for more potential locations to live, idly watched customers coming in and out of the shop.

And then, a buzz and a text, and sure enough, Tooru's real answer: _I'll be there in two weeks._

Even then, you knew that knowing was often about making intangible agreements.

Tooru came in two weeks as he had promised, and as you had wanted. He was tired, irritated, buffeted by the wind and rain.

You didn't miss the dark circles under his eyes, and for a moment, you wondered if you were asking for too much. But he needed to see you as much you needed to see him—he reached for your hand almost as if to take it, and wordlessly greeted you by leaning down to rest his forehead against your shoulder.

And you kissed him there under the overcast light, in the echoing, yet-to-be-furnished apartment you would call yours.

 

 

What precisely happened this morning, instead of flights of calculation or fancy, was this:

You woke to find Tooru's side of the bed already cold. He was considerate enough to put his used breakfast dishes in the sink, but not to wash them.

The note, left on top of the shoe cabinet, was scrawled with his usual round, neat script.

_Iwa-chan,_

_Don't touch the egg tarts!!! I'll give you some later if I'm feeling generous._

_But don't work so late again, or you definitely won't get any._

_Tooru_

You rolled your eyes. He was that strange mix of being both thoroughly obnoxious and endearing, and it was high time you admitted to yourself that you couldn't get enough of it.

But he was more restless than usual, to have woken up early enough to litter his note with so many doodles. One of them included an absentminded pattern of climbing plants that occupied one side of the page, which reminded you of the curious weight in your pocket.  
  
You had been waiting for the right day, the right time. But the perfect day didn't exist, and so you had to make one for yourself.

You could say this trip was spontaneous. But then again, you could also say it was years in the making.

You could say this was meant to mark a significant moment. Or that it marks nothing at all, because it's an acknowledgement of a conjoined line that's been etched for years, and continues on.

 

* * *

 

You do end up taking the blankets out of the trunk. All of them, because Tooru insists on one for you, one for him, one to share, one to sit on, and an extra one for him.

You can only view the sky unaided tonight, on account of having remembered the blankets but forgotten the telescopes. Tooru's a bit put out, until he settles next to you on the grass and decides that the night is salvageable, as it's still clear enough to stargaze.

"Iwa-chan!" He nudges you to make sure he has your attention, even though you're already looking. "See, there's Mars! Right where I'm pointing."

"I see it," you say, catching him, deftly slipping what's in your pocket from one hand to the other, sliding it onto his finger.

"Hey, that's not where I'm—" Tooru begins, then cuts himself off to gasp.

Though it's dark enough to see the stars, the distant, winking city lights still have enough presence to illuminate the silver band of leaves encircling his forefinger.

Tooru's brown eyes widen. And then they gleam, as they do when his brain is whirring to process what's happening. "Are you proposing to me, Iwa-chan? Because this is pretty underwhelming, as far as proposals go. You even put the ring on the wrong finger."

"It's _not_ a proposal," you hasten to correct him. Fortunately it's too dim for him to see your ears burning red. "But other than that, it's. Well. It's what you want it to be."

That's not exactly true. You know what you want of this, of him. But for all the things that go unspoken between the two of you, you've produced the question. You want to hear the answer fall from Tooru's lips, hear for yourself what he makes of what the two of you have become.

"So it _can_ be an engagement ring if I want," Tooru insists, just because he can be petulant. But the fact that he can see himself going that far with you warms you in a way that the blankets don't.

"Idiot, aren't you missing a step? We'd have to be dating first."

"Aren't we?" Tooru presses himself close. His thigh is warm against yours. "Haven't we been dating? For years?"

"Well, we never actually talked about it."

But he could, like you could, sense that at some point, describing yourselves as _best friends_ didn't quite cut it anymore. Best friends didn't hold hands under the table, didn't have one murmuring their yearnings while the other's breath hitched, didn't sleep together. You envied him for being able to call you _Iwa-chan_ throughout those years, because calling him _Oikawa_ was too distant, while _Tooru_ hadn't felt right. At least, not yet.

Tooru snorts. "So this was all a ruse to make me say out loud that we're lovers."

Somehow, his amusement makes you defensive. "I just wanted us to have something for ourselves, all right? Screw what everyone else thinks. "

You hate it when Tooru focuses all of his observational powers on you; he gleans far more than you want him to know, and his eyes light up with delight. "Insecure, are we?"

"Fuck off."

He doesn't, and only inches even closer to leave a wickedly quick kiss on your neck. "You wanted to stake your claim on young, brilliant Oikawa, rising international volleyball player, before he shot so high you couldn't see him anymore."

"That's not even close to the truth."

"You saw all the eyes on your precious and perfect Tooru and decided you had to mark him as yours, lest he be spirited away by someone more dashing than you—"

"Are you even listening to me?"

"Honestly, Iwa-chan, being charmed away by someone else isn't that impossible, given how you don't even try to be just a _little_ charming with me."

He has the audacity to puff out his cheeks, which makes you want to make a jab at him. "I _can_ be personable, you know. Just not around you."

Tooru pouts, drawing back. "How mean!"

You had your fun. But it came at the expense of him leaving, taking the warmth with him. Time to make amends. "Because I don't have to. And if I tried to be, you'd see through it."

Tooru considers this, and his voice is cheerier when his fingers find yours once more. You're cold, but he's freezing, and you instinctively wrap both of your hands around his, feeling a little sorry you didn't think to bring gloves or anything of the like. He was always more sensitive to the elements, more susceptible to the heat and the cold. "It's intriguing, Iwa-chan. I didn't expect you, of all people, to be this sentimental."

You sigh. "Give the ring back, then. I'll return it and use the money for stuff we keep putting off. Like a dehumidifier, or a tool box."

"A _tool box_?" Tooru squawks, snatching his hand away. "Don't you dare!"

"So stop being weird about it."

"It's not fair. You surprised me!"

"Isn't that the point? There's gotta be a person who's doing the surprising, and a person who's surprised. It's never fair."

Tooru is quiet for a minute. You think you've settled this round, until he takes your hand again to place something in your palm.

You curl your fingers to skim the top of it, and the slight crunch as it crumbles makes you immediately realize what it is.

" _Oi_. What are you doing?"

"I want us to match," Tooru explains. Patiently, like _you're_ not the one who's been presented with a half-dead leaf that's been curved into a complete circle.

"This is stupid. You'd better not feel some obligation to pay me back."

You didn't expect, or need, reciprocity in this manner. You'd been experiencing it for a long time before this, after all.

"I'm not paying you back," Tooru retorts. "It's just, well. What's the point of a ring symbolizing us if I'm the only one wearing it? You really didn't think this through, Iwa-chan."

"So you mitigate that by giving me a literal leaf? I'll _eat_ it before I fucking _wear_ it."

Tooru doesn't even miss a beat. "So eat it."

"No! What the hell is wrong with you?"

He's undeterred. Your abrasive nature no longer chafes against him, hasn't worked for a long time, doesn't rub him the wrong way like it used to when he can now pinpoint its true intentions. Plus, he's the most obstinate person you know, and you know what stubbornness is—you're both tied to a sport that demands stamina from its players. "You only mentioned two options: eat it, or wear it. And since you won't eat it, does that mean you'll wear it?"

You grumble in protest. But you don't stop Tooru as he takes your hand to guide the ring—for lack of a better word—onto your index finger, the same place where he wears the ring you gave him on his left hand. He leans back to admire his handiwork.

"Mm! It'll do. But I _will_ properly complete the set someday, Iwa-chan, and you can't stop me. Your ring will definitely be in a bigger size, though. You have such large fingers. Boorish. Thick. Indelicate. Unlike mine."

You tug your hand out of his grasp, making sure he doesn't see how carefully you place it on the blanket to avoid breaking the leaf's circle. "Are you done being insufferable?"

Tooru beams at you, simply satisfied that you've accepted his present and his terms. He's the very picture of innocence, a false sun in the dark. "For now."

"Brat," you say, even as you're already adjusting yourself for him to curl an arm around your waist and rest his head on your shoulder. The small, hard etch of the ring that you can feel on your ribs is new, but not unwelcome.

You both sit in silence, occasionally shifting to keep yourselves warm. Tooru seems more preoccupied with the distant lights in front of him than those above him today. His fingers rub small circles in the fabric of your shirt, making chills erupt along your spine that don't stem from the cold. You're filled with a contentedness you can't put into words, and from the way he's settled against you, he feels the same way.

Eventually, Tooru stops moving. You think he's fallen asleep, but he leans in. "Iwa-chan?"

"What?"

"You know I love you too, right?" His breath is warm as he leaves a kiss on your ear.

You turn to press your lips into his hair. "Yeah. I do."

 

**Author's Note:**

> Bonus alternative ending:
> 
> Tooru: Iwa-chan?  
> Hajime: Yeah?  
> Tooru: You know I would have given you an egg tart anyway, right?  
> Hajime: You thought this whole setup was to bribe you into giving me egg tarts?!
> 
> /cue more squabbling before they grudgingly admit somewhere in between that they're Weak for each other
> 
> \--
> 
> shout outs to mandy for reading the snippets i sent her (that she did not ask for) and pompom-ing me on, and meg for the pep talks and constant support! i am very appreciative that i was not defenestrated <33
> 
> thanks for reading!


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